Plomeek Soup
by Ryan2
Summary: Just a little filling in the blanks...
1. Default Chapter

A/N: Oh gods—haven't written S/Ch fanfic since I was about sixteen, but Djinn's work reminded me how I got into all this in the first place. Everybody's done this. Everybody. But nobody sees it the same way.

Disclaimer: Not mine. Not at all—thanks Theo and Paraborg—don't sue.

Feedback: Aye!

Distribution: Makes me all smiley

Rating: PG-13

Plomeek Soup

I should march back in there and throw it right in his face—

His smug, pointy-eared, completely vulnerable face. Which is how I got myself into this—Instead of just leaving him to his logic, his cold may-he-choke-on-it rations, his dreams *and what was that about anyway…*

Concentrate, Chris. The seeds of the malthya plant has to go in just so, as the mixture begins to boil. 

Cooking and chemistry were both soothing pastimes. You had a formula, you had a procedure, you did the right thing at the right moment, combined the appropriate elements for appropriate effect, and things worked out the way you expected them to. Easy, predictable. And it wasn't hard to bribe Sulu into ignoring a corner of the hydroponics bay. Combine real, unreplicated, plants with the latest Starfleet issue bacteria incubation unit and it makes for a smart little kitchen. 

After all, I am a nurse. Healing people is what I do, that strange mixture of professional and emotional care. McCoy might fix what's ailing you, but it's my duty to get you back on your feet. And don't let anyone fool you, soup was still the cure for half of nature's illnesses, even ones evolving light years from Earth. 

As for the rest, I told myself that the plomeek plants made for good variety—not every species craves tomatoes or my carefully hoarded stock of chicken bullion (Biomedical culture # 2472-3). And of course Mr. Spock wasn't the only Vulcan to come aboard Enterprise, the only Vulcan in Starfleet-- sure, but his father and at least six other…

Oh, who am I trying to kid? They were for Spock. A taste of home, a sentimental gesture, so sue me. See me not be ashamed of my stupid, uncontrollable, adolescent, unrequited love.

Which was why I was using my doctorate in Xenobiology and two years deep space triage experience to hand dice ten-inch long green amorphous blobs which resemble slimy potatoes into a sort of gelatinous puree. Simmer over Bunsen burner: 10 minutes. Stare at wall trying to gather dignity before invading Spock's privacy for the third time that day: 1 hour. Re-heat soup: 10 minutes. Longest cook time for plomeek soup on record and I still wasn't ready to go back in there. 

I knew what was going on. Vulcans were cagey but alien physiology was my specialty and I admit to spending a few more hours than necessary with the Vulcan anatomy files after coming aboard. Besides which, there were only so many ways you could add up elevated sperm count and "Spock has to get to Vulcan or die," before the great unspoken mystery went flying out the door like a bowl of plomeek soup.

And well, yeah, I deserved it. How was I supposed to know good nursing was Vulcan foreplay? And contrary to what you hear in the crew mess, I monitor the eating habits of every crewmember on board. Anorexia is a primary symptom in over two hundred physical and six hundred and fifty emotional maladies. I'm sure in a hundred years they'll have psychiatrists, nutritionists and plastic surgeons floating around on starships but for right now file it under the "supplementary duties" of the ship's head nurse. So my responsibility, sure. Would I have made a home visit to every crewmember on board? *Honesty, Chris* Probably not. But seducing Spock wasn't really on my mind. 

I had figured out that whoever Spock was speeding to Vulcan to mate with wasn't going to be me. And so, I decided to face up to it, save his stupid life and exit with dignity from this sham of a relationship. The soup was supposed to be my final gesture of goodwill—See no hard feelings that you would rather face death than consider me as an alternative, fuck you, good luck, good bye. It seemed like a good idea at the time. 

Granted, I expected a comment on the illogic of making something by hand with replicators on board, or even a lecture on unauthorized use of the ship's facilities, I was not expecting plomeek soup to come flying by at warp five and any last shreds of dignity I had left after Psy-2000 joining it on the bulkhead. Christine Chapel finally drives Vulcan to insanity with her immature crush, vid at eleven. Which still doesn't explain why he did it, why he reacted like a, *human*, --don't think it, like a male pushed right to the limit, finding it impossible to resist—what, temptation?

Give it up Chris, temptation implies he wants you. 

It also doesn't explain why he didn't throw you into the brig for using medical override to sneak back into his quarters. Nope all he did was look at you with those eyes, like flame…

And then he did more than look. If I close my eyes I can still feel it. I keep expecting it to show, the memory of those burning fingers against my face becoming overt, physical, branded. And his words, a code I could almost unlock—our natures… 

What the hell did he mean by that? Wasn't that the problem, my illogical human nature to adore him? And why love him anyway? Uninterested, uninvolved, unemotional—except for the sadness, so poorly concealed within that patented Vulcan reserve; and in that sadness I saw my own. 

Resonance, I suppose we are all looking for it, the reason why some proteins come together, why the strange mechanics of the body join and recombine—something missing, something seeking. Which doesn't explain why I didn't give up. Though I suppose that was my nature as well, to persist in faith even in the absence of all evidence, encouragement, *logic.* After all, I was right, Roger was waiting to be found, even when I had lost all reason for wanting to find him. 

Leaving me with a broken heart, a rapidly cooling bowl of plomeek soup and a sense of unease, of lost chances.

And what of him, anyway? More Vulcan than pure Vulcans, more vulnerable than anyone I had ever known, unable to choose a human woman as his father had done, because his father had done so—perhaps regretting that, perhaps burning… 

Right now it is in his nature to mate.

True, correct, logical even, but not with me. The other shoe was going to drop any second now and I was sure she had pointy ears. Which is why this was the best plomeek soup in the quadrant, if I could ever work up the nerve to get it to him. 

It was, of course, the exact moment for my hair to conquer the hairspray and fall down from its heavy knot. Starfleet protocols aside, I hated the uniforms and regulation hairstyles. Uniform was a must, this was a purely professional pathetic last gesture of affection—hair was a necessary sacrifice. I gathered it into a simple braid, prayed to the gods of scuttlebutt no one would see me *skulking to his quarters in the dead of night like a whore.* And see, yeah, I admit it. But it didn't stop me. Last check at all the equipment safely shut down, and I was off.

Beware lovesick nurses bearing soup—I meant it sarcastically but it came out sounding like an invocation.

And then the door slid open.


	2. Chapter 2

He was back in the corner again, but sensing me, he uncoiled and slid toward the door. Perhaps it was the illness, but he was more fluid, more *dangerous,* the word escaped me but it was true nevertheless—Dangerous, like the air before a storm.

He takes the tray from my hands and I feel the slightest gentle sweep of his fingers across mine. Usually Spock was scrupulous about avoiding contact—touch telepathy, Vulcan reserve and human emotions didn't mix, but today he seemed careless, almost eager to initiate it. It was almost, seductive…

Don't even think it Chris.

"I hope the soup is satisfactory, I'll be going then." 

About face, march to the door. I'm not going to break down. That was professional, that was dignified, that was almost unspeakably…

"…cold."

"What?" It was only after I turned that I realized I had spoken aloud.

"…cold. I burn, but it is cold."

Damn. Damn. Damn. I had almost made it out the door without giving in to the desire to comfort him. Even now I couldn't help it—this rising tide of almost unbearable joy that he had allowed me close enough to help him.

And yes, I am aware of just how pathetic that makes me.

"The temperature control for your cabin is set to maximum." 

I'm clinging to facts, hoping my language will downplay his helplessness, distract him from the fact I am walking over to the bed. But his eyes follow me, and I am suddenly conscious of every step I take. I feel like prey, I feel completely naked, I realize I am totally, inexplicably, more turned on than I have ever been in my life. I hand him the blanket. It trembles and I have no idea whose hands are shaking.

My brain is giving me extremely specific instructions—something about making it to the door and getting the hell out of here before I throw myself at him, worse than Psy-2000 because I have nothing to blame it on but the heaviness of the air and his eyes like two dark endless holes in space burning with swallowed light and I am going to make it because there is nothing he can say to stop me except…

"Christine."

I freeze, totally and completely.

His hand is on my arm and I spin around—not sure what I fear more, his touch or its imminent withdrawal.

"…Christine, you have ascertained the nature of my condition."

It's not a question, but I nod anyway. God knows he's spared my dignity a time or two.

He lets out a sigh. It's the most human gesture I have ever seen him make—his hands unclench and sweep like magnets across the air to my face.

I literally feel time pause, all I can see are his hands slowly approaching—and I know what's coming, dreamed about it, fantasized about it, imagined it enough times that I shouldn't even question it. And it wasn't fear of being seen, he knew all my secrets anyway—It was the fear of what I would find. That underneath it all I had been wrong: there was no pain, no heart, and I was wearing another woman's face to him. Which would make me a whore in fact, rather than ship's gossip.

His hands pause only the barest distance from my skin.

"With your permission…" he whispers. I can't speak. It's all I can do to place my hands over his and guide him home. 

Once we had begun, there was only one logical conclusion. Warm, he was so warm. They call him cold, but he was all fire inside—tenderness, passion, savage, sweet. My own chill surprised him. My distance, my walls, the way I let Roger touch me without knowing me, keeping myself secret, safe. He opened his mind to me and I saw a little boy crying over a creature in a desert burning red and brown in the sunset, and I felt it, resonance. 

He had always seen the emotion in me, it was my own stillness he hadn't understood. The peace of research, the steady path to understanding each new species, each new intricate, marvelously common system for sustaining life. 

*Infinite diversity in infinite combinations* 

And then his own studies unfolded, the Vulcan philosophy that drew him into space. His frustration with the Science Academy that hardly ever bothered to explore the newness waiting out there, so caught up with hugging the red sands of home.

*Your mind is restful, Christine* 

But he had underestimated me, again. Almost immediately he found it, the passion I had never felt, the love I somehow couldn't hide. He felt my shame, at this one thing that I couldn't control, my bitter humor that a woman even Roger had described as restrained, should be known to her new crewmates as this pitiful, passive, lovesick child. 

*The loss of control is painful to me as well.* 

And then he shared with me ponn farr: I saw myself, coming to his quarters. His fight not to claim me, the Vulcan ritual older than logic which led a woman to offer herself to a man for bonding. Later, waking up to see me there, my own stupid, so carefully chosen words, which instead of giving him hope, reminded him fatally of his course, and who waited for him there. And then I saw her, beautiful, and as distant as the neutral zone. A statue brought to life, who would look upon that glorious fire and condemn it. 

He thought me brave? For what, making a fool over him? 

*For your integrity. Your ability to abandon the opinions of others and trust yourself.*

And then it overwhelmed me, everything, things I'd guessed, things I had never even imagined. And when I looked down it didn't surprise me that we were on the bed, our bodies already striving toward the place we had reached so effortlessly through the bond.

He was simply everywhere. I was, open. So terrifyingly, completely open. Any wall I had ever imagined, any pretense I had attempted to feign, evaporated. There was so much more than I had ever realized. So much more left for me to feel, and in that instant *for there were no secrets and I knew how temporary it must be,* I experienced the unspeakable joy of being held, for the first time, by a man who knew all of me and loved me anyway. 

I was going to pay. Getting what I always dreamed of had completely, forever and always ruined any chance I ever had of leaving him behind. I'd love him until the day I died, and I would spend the rest of my life trying to get back to this strange sheltered paradise we found.

*And I will spend the rest of my life, trying to forget.*

It was the truth. But what surprised me was how little it hurt. Understanding, for the first time, really understanding him, I could see there was no other choice for us. A marriage of state was already arranged, and even if it wasn't, the Vulcan way demanded a Vulcan wife. I was as forbidden as the apple and twice as tempting and I knew he would avoid me even more profoundly than before. 

As I would avoid him

Not because I wasn't still in love, but because now I knew just how much pain I'd caused him. 

*Like staring into a warm space when you are freezing.*

Which is why he allowed himself to gather me close, this one last time. 

Behind his eyes the room was the restful rust of the desert at dawn, a shade of old blood and healing scars. 

We sank easily into the same dream. And in our dreams, morning stayed far from us, and rattled its chains.


End file.
